But lately, something has shifted. The noise feels more muted, the glamour a little faded.
The sight of horses being whipped down the straight no longer carries the same thrill for many of us. Instead, there’s an unease, an internal grimace.
Reports of animal cruelty, injuries, and the number of horses “retired” or euthanised after their usefulness has ended have steadily eroded the hype. What was once a celebration of sport now feels like an echo of an outdated gladiatorial spectacle, a reminder of how our values evolve.
The world is becoming more conscious of how we treat animals, the environment, and even each other. The idea of forcing animals to perform for our entertainment doesn’t sit as easily in a society that’s learning to care more deeply and think more critically.
Even the TAB, that great institution of the Kiwi punt, feels caught in the same shift.
It’s still there, but not quite the community fixture it once was.
The rise of online gambling has made betting more private, less social, and sometimes more harmful. Yet there’s another way to think about the TAB.
In the disability world, TAB means a non-disabled person, as in “Temporarily Able-Bodied” – meaning that everyone will experience disability at some stage in their life. It may be as a result of an accident, or simply the ageing process, which is bound to give you an impairment of one kind or another.
Disability is a naturally occurring part of life.
My friend Jon has experienced this. He recently had surgery on his shoulder for an old rugby wound.
It was more extensive than he had predicted. They detached both muscles from the joint as they cleaned up cartilage and bone fragments. Jon is usually a very hands-on kind of guy, always up to something physical, but after the op, his left arm was mummified in bandages.
His hand looked like Andre the Giant’s hand with a zombie hue to it. He’s fast becoming familiar with doing things in a one-handed fashion.
It made me pause, because that little acronym sums up a lot. We’re all, in a sense, temporarily able-bodied – one accident, one illness, or one surgery away from needing support or adaptation.
It’s a humbling thought, and maybe one that invites a bit more compassion, for humans and animals alike.
Maybe that’s part of the reason why events like the Melbourne Cup or Addington no longer feel like national holidays.
We’re changing. We’re learning to value empathy over spectacle, connection over competition. The gloss of the old traditions is giving way to a more modern understanding that life in all its forms deserves respect.
Times are changing.
